The present invention relates to corrugated pallets, and in particular to the type of corrugated pallets which have been developed for the purpose of providing inexpensive and yet light weight pallets constructed of corrugated cardboard.
As is presently known, pallets are widely used in all industries for the purpose of stacking and transporting various goods. In the past, pallets were formed of wood, in order to lend rigidity and strength to the pallet and so that merchandise of great weight could be stacked and transported thereon. However, with the advent of conservation, and preservation of the natural resources, the use of wood for constructing pallets has been deemed to be undesirable. Even more importantly, it has been determined by many countries in the world that wood is a nesting place for various types of bacteria and other undesirable germs, especially when the wood has become wet or is rotting. Many countries, therefore, have enacted rules and regulations for the importation of products which are stacked on wood pallets. Indeed, many countries require that wood pallets cannot be introduced into the country that have not been properly fumigated. This in turn causes several problems for the reason that in order to fumigate the pallets, it is necessary to fumigate even the product stacked on the pallets, which therefore introduces undesirable chemicals into the products that are being stacked and transported. For this reason, alternate types of materials have been utilized in connection with the construction of pallets.
In this connection, the art has gravitated toward corrugated pallets which are made of corrugated paper and other materials which are relatively inexpensive, but yet capable of bearing weight, and are totally recyclable. Applicant herein is the owner of U.S. Pat. No. 4,487,136, which is directed to a pallet construction and claims a corrugated pallet having leg elements which are installed onto the pallet deck which yields a construction for a corrugated pallet having sufficient strength for virtually all applications in connection with the stacking and the transporting of goods placed thereon. Applicant has further improved on this type of construction in U.S. Pat. No. 4,850,284 which relates to a cross-laminated pallet deck in order to further enhance the rigidity and strength of the subject pallet.
Applicant has made a further improvement as demonstrated in U.S. Pat. No. 5,289,781, which basically relates to the method of forming the finger elements which participate in the manner and method by which the pallet legs are secured to the pallet deck.
As Applicant has demonstrated in its prior patents, the method of attaching the pallet legs to the pallet is by die cutting a plurality of finger elements in a tangentially radiating manner in order to create a substantially spiral pattern with the fingers. The core legs are installed into the pallet deck by twisting an inner leg in the direction of the spiral pattern of the finger elements, and nesting the inner leg within an outer leg having the fingers interposed in the annulus formed there between. Attachment is achieved by means of the use of an adhesive which is applied to the finger elements such that once the finger elements are nested within the annulus formed between the inner and outer leg elements, the cores forming the leg elements will become adhesively secured to the pallet deck via the finger elements.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,289,781 represents an improvement on that process in that each of the finger elements is further provided with a series of perforations linearally aligned down the center of each finger element such that once an adhesive is applied to the finger elements, the adhesive is permitted to permeate through the finger elements and more securely attach the inner and outer core leg members to the finger elements and hence to the pallet deck.
It has now been observed that the manner in which the core legs are installed onto the pallet, requiring a twisting action of the inner leg in the direction of the spiral pattern of the finger elements, in order to nest the inner leg within an outer leg with the finger elements interposed in the annulus formed therebetween, that such twisting action will, on occasion, cause a fracturing of the material forming the finger elements. The fracturing is caused, on occasion, as the inner leg is twistingly engaged in order to grasp the finger elements between the inner and outer core leg members. It has been determined that in the event that any fracturing of the material occurs, this may have the tendancy to reduce the relative strength of the pallet leg relative to the pallet deck.
The present invention seeks, therefore, to eliminate the problem of a material fracturing, as will be more fully described hereinafter.